2. misc-audio
  3. 169601-165740

Is improvisational jazz to impressionism art as smooth jazz is to realism art?

So, I’ll acknowledge up front, I’m an engineer. Civilian and Warfighter lives can be in the balance depending on whether our company products perform as required or not. As a result, I try very hard to drive the entropic world we live in towards black and white as much as possible. I need to put order to chaos. When i look at art, impressionistic art requires a lot of mental work to make sense of. I just don't see it or get it, appreciate it or like it. I also find, as hard as i may try to enjoy improvisational jazz, that i don't get it, appreciate it, or like it. Instead, I love Realism art and instrumental smooth jazz!!
Reading from Audiogon forum pages for a couple of years now, i feel like i should feel inferior because 1. I don’t appreciate the free flow of expression that is improvisational jazz and 2. I love that there is a tune and thread in smooth jazz. I love the guitar artistry of Chuck Loeb, Chris Standring, and Acoustic Alchemy; the trumpet expressions of Rick Braun, Cindy Bradley, and Chris Botti; and the bass works of Brian Bromberg. 
I’m curious if there are many others out there that equate order (or lack there-of) in their music tastes to that of their taste in the visual arts?
Also, are there many other music lovers who would rather enjoy a good smooth jazz listening session than improvisational jazz?  If so, who do you listen to?
128x128estreams
yuviarora's avatar
yuviarora
537 posts
 
The sound guy,   when  we told him that the volume  was unbearably loud, told us they have ear plugs at the door for all the guests....For real, he actually said that, implying that guests asked for ear plugs all the time, and they  were ready in advance. 
Imagine paying 30 bucks a person to go to a Jazz show, and then having to sit there  with ear plugs for an hour and a half. 
Up is Down....Damn the CIA Inversion. 
marklings
61 posts
 
@stuartk 
I have been largely misunderstood. I totally get that impro / spontaneity in creating something is pure art. I never said and never imagined it to be below classical or anything else. I am not castigating anything at all. I just don't like it. Can I ? I tried and found out it's not my thing.
stuartk
2,766 posts
 
@marlkings:

OK-- sorry for misunderstanding you. 

When you said you 1) didn't like improv and 2) that you "like order and structure and purpose and overall sense of a composition", I thought you were saying that you don't enjoy improv BECAUSE IT LACKS "order and structure and purpose and overall sense of a composition", but apparently you meant something else. 

My mistake, then,



denverfred's avatar
denverfred
252 posts
 
NO
mijostyn's avatar
mijostyn
8,570 posts
 
"A man's got to know his limits." 

I do not equate visual art and music.
I am far from an art expert. I either like it or I do not and I have never paid enough attention to it to make sense out of it. 

I make furniture. Humans use furniture for specific purposes. In order to be useful furniture has to accommodate human dimensions. A chair seat has to have a certain height. Same for tables. Furniture has to be made within a set of rules which is what makes it challenging. You want to be original but you have to do it within rules. What good is a nice looking chair you can't sit in? Music is exactly the same or you are playing tennis without a net. I enjoy challenging music like Henry Threadgill's To Much Sugar For a Dime or Eric Dolphy's Out to Lunch. But, there is a limit to western ears. The late John Coltrane work like Ascension leave me cold. There is nothing I can hum or tap my foot to, just a succession of dissonant notes and pace-less rhythms. 

If you want to see/hear a mind that produced both visual art and Music
google Don Van Vliet. 
More to discover